Reviews

Limitless Review: Rating - 6.4/10 [31st August 2011]

I didn’t actually plan to watch Limitless let alone write a review about it, but my sister very kindly bought it for me after my successful GCSE results and hey, I can’t say I’m disappointed by it. Set in present day New York, Eddie Morra (Bradley Cooper) is a failing writer who has the attention span of a goldfish and hasn’t written one word of his book. So when he bumps into his ex-brother-in-law, his life takes a sudden upshot as he is handed a pill that lets you access 100 percent of your brain power, granting Eddie with super human qualities which allows him to complete his book in four days, become fluent in languages within seconds of picking it up and enhances his memory so everything he’s ever seen or heard is now full knowledge and available for him to talk about when socialising. Sound interesting? It is. In fact I’ve been quite interested myself in the fact that we only access 20 percent of our brains, some say we could even harness telekinetic powers (the ability to control objects with your mind), but that’s for another day...

    So was it any good? Well, it's okay I guess, it could’ve been better but it isn’t bad by any means. I would go on to explain more of the plot but I think that would mean giving a few spoilers away and nobody wants that, all I’ll say is shit hits the fan because at the end of the day he’s dealing with experimental drugs so... what did you expect? Bradley Cooper plays Eddie and considering Cooper’s still relatively new to big budget films, he is a terrific actor, showing he can play comedy very well in roles such as Yes Man and The Hangover (which were two big breaks for him) and now has had a serious part as Eddie. As an actor he has fantastic range, he’s got the looks, the charm, and the humour and is perfect for quite a few roles.

    Robert De Niro also stars as a multi-millionaire businessman who Eddie goes into business with after making over two million dollars in a week due to his enhanced math ability. De Niro is okay in the film despite being one the greatest actors of our time but he isn’t given much to do, he’s pretty much just a cameo to make the film sell, anyone could’ve played that role for Pete’s sake. Oh and Abbie Cornish plays Eddie’s love interest who just can’t make up her mind whether Eddie’s a waste of space or the love of her life. She’s okay as well I guess, nothing special though as the main focus is on Eddie so the supporting cast only serve the purpose to make sure you don’t get too bored of Cooper after a while.

    Although I thought the direction of the movie could’ve been better albeit a serviceable one, I don’t think it’s the film’s big problem. Personally, I don’t think the film can decide what it wants to be, it’s juggling too much so to speak. It’s a Thriller, Drama, Horror, Suspense, Mystery, Romance and a Sci-Fi all at the same time; just pick a couple for Christ’s sake! So there’s Limitless, a film which could have been, but sadly was not to be, a full-on eyeball rape at times and a very hazy story which loses focus of where it’s headed (due to the weak directing) but still comes out to be an adequate film, worth a watch but don’t get your hopes up.

 The Inbetweeners Movie Review: Rating - 8.1/10 [24th August 2011]

 If you’re anywhere between the age of fifteen to twenty-five and British (like me), there’s a very, very good chance you’ve seen The Inbetweeners before and subsequently seen the new Inbetweeners Movie as a result. Now for those who don’t know, The Inbetweeners is a British T.V. series which follows the lives of four extremely socially backward sixth formers from the south of England. The first two series was fresh, original, and hilarious comedy which made us impressionable young’uns guffaw at every mishap they found themselves in. Unfortunately the third series was a bit repetitive and many of us aforementioned idiots with a slightly higher brain count than the rest noticed this and it seems the producers noticed this too, so instead of making a fourth series, they made a feature length movie as a sort of farewell/ ‘bon voyage’ to the entire story.

    So does the very difficult transition from T.V. series to full length movie work? Well, ultimately yes, there are a few moments when the film doesn’t feel like a film at all; just an extended episode but it brings a fresh approach to what I thought was a big gamble and was either going to be brilliant or awful. And I am pleased to announce that it’s the former. This film is hilarious. Transcending its predecessor to a new level this is easily better than all three series and was much better than I expected. Some of the comedy was rehashed from the old series but worked because they were in a new environment so it felt original and other bits of comedic genius were completely new and will make you roar with laughter. I also thought the whole ‘going on a lad’s holiday thing’ worked excellently as it is what so many of us Brits do after we leave college and therefore felt very authentic.

    At the end of series three Will, Simon, Jay & Neil finished their education at sixth form and we all thought that would be the end of it, but the film follows on from that, where they decide to go on holiday to Crete. The laughs start even before they get there with early gags such as ‘Simon’s dad talking in the car about his mum’ and new stuff such as ‘Jay’s dad meeting Neil’s dad for the first time’ (I think we all know what was said then). The plot doesn’t really begin until about twenty minutes into the holiday when they meet four similar girls (except for Alison) and cue the romantic comedy from there on in. It’s rather sweet actually how it rounds the story off and there are even hints of juxtaposition as on one side you have the loutish, socially awkward boys and on other you have the pretty, kind hearted girls who somehow manage to come together so perfectly. In fact, I think adding romance was the best thing that could’ve happened to the film because it gives the whole narrative meaning when it literally could’ve just been them getting drunk all week and finally getting that first shag that they’ve always wanted.

    I really do enjoy watching the four main actors in this, they were very talented in the T.V. series and then to be able to sustain that form of entertainment for 97 minutes is wholly impressive. Simon Bird plays Will, a boy who was thrown out of private education and into comprehensive schooling as a result of his parent’s divorce. Throughout the three series he befriends three boys of equal social standing who aren’t quite as disgusting as some of the pupils there but aren’t as good looking as some of them either, hence their title (the Inbetweeners) which not only refers to their social reputation but just about everything they do in life. The three boys are Simon, (Joe Thomas) Jay, (James Buckley) & Neil (Blake Harrison). Simon is Will’s best friend pretty much, who hangs around with him the most and is the one always chasing the love of his life: Carli D’Amato. Jay is the ‘bullshitter’ of the group which incidentally renders him the funniest as well, and Neil is the loveable moron every group of friends has who looks to Jay for guidance in what to do, sort of like a Lennie & George friendship from Of Mice and Men. The actors absolutely nail their performances then, but what about the directing?

    Well, the film was directed by Ben Palmer who (to my surprise) directed the original three series and has had no experience in feature length films before so with that in mind I think he’s done an excellent job. As good as this film is though, I can’t help but feel that it’s narrowed down its target audience a bit too much. To actually understand the humour you have to have at least watched one of the previous series and on top of that be of a certain demographic, preferably my demographic, the young one, which doesn’t mind all the rude jokes et cetera.

    So that’s The Inbetweeners Movie for you. It’s lewd, crude and utterly rude but if you’re of a certain age group (like me) you will love this film. However if you’re not, I would avoid it, particularly if you get offended easily, this film is not for the faint hearted unfortunately. But overall, the jokes are mostly in great taste and it depicts the lives in which a lot of us young delinquents live quite truthfully. So I recommend this film but only for the right person, go watch it and I’ll see you next week.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes Review: Rating - 8.2/10 [17th August 2011]

After a week spent procrastinating on a rainy English holiday I have returned to review Rise of the Planet of the Apes, but before that let me just sum up Captain America: the First Avenger. An average, generic Superhero flick which doesn’t bring anything new to the table, is predictable and overall very disappointing, that said, you may enjoy it if you’re a massive Superhero geek but for the average moviegoer this probably won’t be the film for you, especially if you’ve seen The Dark Knight. Anyway on with the monkey uprising...

    The film is a prequel to the Planet of the Apes saga and in particular Conquest of the Planet of the Apes as it follows the birth of Caesar and his inevitable retribution against humanity. James Franco has the lead as Will Rodman, a personally motivated scientist who works for a shady corporation who experiment on animals (primarily apes) to try and find cures for diseases. Will’s father (John Lithgow) suffers from Alzheimer’s and so is driven to try and find a cure no matter what. However, when an Ape breaks out of his cage and causes a lot of trouble, the Ape’s are put down, except for one, a new born ape who is given to Will to look after and whom he raises as a pet. Said pet is Caesar who is played by some unbelievably impressive performance capture technology by motion capture veteran Andy Serkis which I’ll talk about later. The main focus of the film then is Will’s relationship with Caesar which drives the plot and lets events unfold. The narrative is solid throughout and never really loses focus of the centre of attention; Caesar.

    Franco puts in an impressive performance but his character doesn’t have much range at all and therefore is very limited, still good to watch though. Freida Pinto plays Will’s flimsy love interest who serves no purpose at all as the central relationship is between Will and Caesar. Tom Felton is pretty good as Dodge the nasty animal keeper who is most definitely never going to play a good guy after being Draco Malfoy for ten years. Brian Cox plays Brian Cox in the Brian Cox story (same acting in every movie I swear to God!) and John Lithgow registers on some kind of emotional level as Will’s Alzheimer’s afflicted father. But by far the star of the film is Andy Serkis. Proving himself to be the best motion capture actor around at the moment with roles such as Gollum and King Kong, it’s no doubt that due to his hard work and dedication to film making that he was going to be brilliant in this, and he was, no doubt about it, seriously deserves an Oscar sometime soon.

    The directing comes courtesy of Rupert Wyatt who has a very small record of directing films but here is surprisingly good. Patrick Doyle’s composed a very fast paced score which although I wouldn’t like to listen to it on my Ipod, there’s no doubt that it fits the film’s pacing perfectly. As far as negatives are concerned there isn’t much to worry about, my only problems are the fact that Pinto’s character is completely obsolete and the title; good God what were they thinking? Rise of the Planet of the Apes?? How awkward is that to say? However those are very minor problems that I picked up on and they don’t affect the overall feel of the film in any way.

This is a very short review but that’s probably a good thing, as there’s not much to say as ‘go see it, it’s awesome’ although I will stress that this film’s intended audience are probably people who either think animal cruelty’s wrong or love animals in general, so if you’re neither... you’re probably just the worst person ever, but you’re probably not going to enjoy this as much as you could. Speaking as the antisocial, misanthrope that I occasionally am though, the best thing about this film for me is that it’s one of the few disaster movies which puts the cause of it all right out there and just says ‘it’s because people are pricks!’ something which I find endlessly humorous as when you get right down to it, the main message of the film is just ‘be nicer to animals and apes in particular’, which if they had done, the whole mess could’ve been avoided in the first place. Ah us humans are the master of ignorance are we not? So there you have it, Rise of the Planet of the Apes is a damn, damn good movie, and it would be a shame if this was ignored because people think it’s a load of men in suits running around and so go watch the new Glee movie instead (unless you were planning on seeing that anyway...) but no, it’s much, much more than that. See you all next week.

Unknown Review: Rating - 5.0/10 [3rd August 2011]

Why did I watch this? Something in the back of my mind was telling me that this wasn’t going to be good but I just ploughed straight ahead, didn’t I? (Actually I watched it on a recommendation from my dad, last time I ever listen to him about what films to watch). Okay, here goes. Unknown follows the lives of Dr. Martin Harris (Liam Neeson) and his wife Elizabeth Harris (January Jones) who are travelling to Berlin to attend a biological conference or something and on the way Dr. Harris enjoys a casual car crash into a river and wakes up in a coma four days later. Turns out someone have stolen his identity and with the help of the God-awful taxi driver who put him in the coma in the first place (Diane Kruger) they set out to uncover the truth. Did you enjoy reading that? Because I certainly didn’t enjoy writing it; trying to describe the plot of this film is pointless if I’m not to give any spoilers away. So anyway here’s the review to Unknown...

    Now unless you have the deductive powers of a teapot, I’m sure you’ve figured out that I don’t like this film. Congratulations have a cookie; now give the cookie back because you’re wrong. I don’t dislike this film, I loathe this film. A pathetic and feeble attempt to try and copy the Bourne films’ style of acting, directing, pacing, plot and just about everything that made the Bourne films so brilliant, and fails more than a crack head trying to pass a drugs test. In fact, I’ll try to keep this review short and sweet as to write about this pile of shit anymore would render me sleepless. 

    Liam Neeson accidentally stars as the exact same character from Taken and instantly proves one thing: he can’t act in action films as a lead role, as if Taken wasn’t enough proof already. Films like this are meant for actors like Bruce Willis! Stop stealing Bruce’s films Neeson! Stuff like missing daughters and lost identities are Bruce Willis territory, so to cross the line Neeson would have to do a pretty bloody good job to impress. And unfortunately, he doesn’t. Instead, he puts on this really odd voice when he’s angry (sort of how the ‘Churchill’ dog would say it if he were on cocaine), personal favourites include: ‘I’m Martin Harris!’ & ‘give me back my daughter!’ January Jones has a surprisingly small role in it and is overshadowed by the much superior Diane Kruger who does a great job despite the fact she’s in a terrible film. It was also great to see Bruno Ganz (Downfall) in it which came as a pleasant surprise but he doesn’t have much to do which is a terrible shame and I blame the bog-standard directing not being able to actually ‘direct’ such talent. Said ‘director’ is Juame Collet-Serra a man with not only a bizarre name but a piss-poor excuse of a filmography; five measly films, four of which aren’t even worth mentioning but this one only gets a mention because of how rubbish it is.

    Time to list more negatives/complaints. 1. The amount of continuity errors isn’t even funny, (especially considering that I don’t even spot them most of the time, probably because I’ve been ENJOYING the movie). 2. When a car drops from the second storey of a car park I do not expect it to burst into flames and explode. 3. I do not want the main protagonist to have his life saved twice from a woman with no fighting experience at all, particularly because we find out later in the film that said protagonist is a TRAINED ASSASSIN. 4. Why does said trained assassin suck at fighting for the entire film up until the last part where he suddenly ‘remembers how to kill [him].’ What’s up with that? 5. Stop ripping off Bourne you idiots! Try and make up your own original action flick instead of copy and pasting the plot from The Bourne Ultimatum (a good film) and 6. Why is the plot annoyingly confusing at times and doesn’t even have the common decency to entertain you while it does so? The list is endless. 

    So to sum up, go watch either Taken or the Bourne trilogy (or both) because Lord knows they’re both better than what this piece of crap is trying to be. It actually saddens me to think that Liam Neeson, the man who once portrayed Oscar Schindler so beautifully, could even consider being in a film like this. Taken I found okay because I thought it was just a one-off; a talented actor trying to become more diverse, I didn’t realise films like The A-Team & Clash of the Titans were paying the bills for him these days. Ah well, one can only hope he gets out of this genre and quick before he permanently becomes embedded in these weak entertainment films. See you in two weeks!

Horrible Bosses Review: Rating - 7.0/10 [27th July 2011]

On paper Horrible Bosses should be an absolute riot; an excellent cast, a hilarious-sounding premise and the fact that it has Kevin Spacey in it. But in reality it’s not as funny as it could have been, don’t get me wrong it’s hilarious in parts and the comedy is carefully constructed but it’s lacking in originality. And do you know who I blame? The Hangover. I wish I didn’t have to go pointing fingers but I really do think that it’s to blame. Not because of the film itself but because of its knock-on-effect with a lot of comedies that have been released since. Films like Horrible Bosses & Due Date are all just post-Hangover rip-offs all striving to achieve the commercial success that The Hangover raked in. Even The Hangover Part II is trying to be as good as its predecessor (and fails spectacularly). Consequently, I can’t help but notice that they’re all squabbling over who’s the funniest. Now we’ve got otherwise hilarious actors like Charlie Day trying to act like Zach Galifianakis, and actors like Zach Galifianakis trying to act like Zach Galifianakis, it’s madness! Why can’t we accept that The Hangover was side-splittingly funny and move on?

    Anyway, on with the review. Well, let me just read out some of the stars of this film: Kevin Spacey, Jennifer Aniston, Colin Farrell, Jason Bateman & Jamie Foxx to name a few. So, as I’m sure you’ve guessed I was pretty hyped about seeing this and yes the actors deliver. It’s quite surprising actually because usually a film with this many stars gets bogged down and feels like it’s trying too hard but not this. The acting feels real throughout and it seems that the film has conveniently split the actors into two sections, how kind.

    I’ll start with the employers or ‘bosses’ if you’re American and overweight. Spacey plays Dave Harken, a relentless psycho of a boss who cheats Jason Bateman’s character out of a promotion and works him overtime to the point where he has no social life and misses important events. Aniston plays Dr. Julian Harris, a hilarious sexual deviant who is absolutely set on harassing Charlie Day’s character and blackmails him into performing sexual acts and so on and so forth. Whilst Farrell is a cocaine-fuelled asshole who forces Jason Sudeikis’ character into firing people for no sufficient reason (i.e. because they’re fat). The big problem I had with Farrell’s character though, is the fact that he didn’t get much screen time which is a real shame because he was my favourite boss. I’ve got to be honest though, I love the bosses. Each actor executes their character perfectly and they’re realistically horrible without compromising the film’s integrity by being over the top horrible. (This is probably why they got such experienced actors to play ‘The Bosses’).

    On the other side of the actors we have the employees. Bateman plays Nick Hendricks, a workaholic of a man who gets no respect for the work he puts in and is repeatedly put down by his boss Harken. Day plays Dale Arbus, a dental nurse who recently got engaged and who has ‘always wanted to be a husband.’ But with his raunchy boss Harris always wanting him to have sex with her, his engagement is in jeopardy. In truth, I really like Day, I haven’t seen him in anything else but there were flairs of comedic talent in some scenes and overall he was pretty funny to watch. However, I can’t decide whether he was ripping-off Zach Galifianakis’ character Alan from The Hangover or whether he was just inspired to act like that. You decide. And finally Jason Sudeikis plays Kurt Buckman, a man who adores his job and his boss for that matter... that is until his loveable boss (Donald Sutherland) takes a turn for the worst and his aforementioned asshole son takes over. Sudeikis does a pretty good job and will probably be in more films subsequently.

    The premise for the film (if you haven’t already guessed or figured out from the trailers) is about the three employees making the decision that their lives would be a whole lot easier if they’re bosses weren’t alive. So, they hire a ‘murder consultant’ (Jamie Foxx) to help kill their bosses and that’s pretty much it. A simple but effectively funny plot to let the characters do their stuff and make us laugh, which they do. There aren’t really many negatives to the film, a big one would be if it’s not funny but seeing as it is, I can’t really use that one. I’ll mention the fact that there a few plot holes but to go into them would be totally and utterly pointless so don’t worry about that. No, the only real problem I have is what I mentioned earlier, my whole ‘Hangover’ theory which you’re probably sick of hearing by now so don’t worry about that either.

    Overall then, it’s a funny film and I recommend you go see it, whether you love Spacey or Bateman or Farrell et cetera, I recommend it. It won’t have you in stitches (it certainly didn’t have me or my friend in stitches) but it will make you smile and laugh and any comedy that does that can’t be a bad one. Sorry to have to cut the review a bit short this week but it’s my birthday today, not that I wrote the review today, that would be sad...

 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part Two Review: Rating - 6.5/10 [20th July 2011]

Oh what’s the point? Seriously, what is the point in me reviewing the last Harry Potter? No point at all really. Everyone knows what side they’re on when it comes to this franchise so I suppose this review goes out to the small proportion of people who have no knowledge of the Harry Potters but are interested in seeing them. And that’s a very small proportion.

    So, what did I think of this latest and final instalment to the most successful film franchise in cinema history? Surprisingly disappointing. This film is such an anticlimax I was rendered useless and helpless as I left the cinema, not knowing what to do or think; I was in pieces. You see, I was really looking forward to watching this, I naively thought ‘yeah, part one has set it up really well for a big finale in part two, I can’t wait to go see it!’ And now having watched the film I look back at those thoughts in shame and disgust. No, it’s not a bad film and you should definitely go see it just to see how it rounds the story off, but the whole thing feels very rushed in some scenes and there are a few things that really annoyed me which I’ll talk about later.

    To start with let’s discuss the acting. There is no doubt that from a very young age you can tell these actors have a remarkable talent, some more than others yes, but there’s no denying they did an excellent job acting in some massive films at such young ages. However, as they’ve gotten older I fear some of their acting has deteriorated. Particularly from Daniel Radcliffe who plays Harry Potter, not that he’s done a bad job as such, just has had less of an on-screen presence in comparison to some of the other actors, despite being the main character. On the other hand, the most consistent actor out of all the kids I think is Tom Felton who plays Draco Malfoy, a very hard character to play indeed, Draco is always on the fence in the story, not knowing whether to follow people his age or follow his parents. Rupert Grint has always been impressive as well, adding comedy to the saga even at its darkest times. The two best actors in the whole series though are easily Ralph Fiennes (Voldemort) & Alan Rickman (Snape) who give the films their signature style, in fact I would recommend watching the films solely just to those two.

    There have been several directors over the course of the films but the one who has directed the most is David Yates who incidentally directed this last one too. To be honest I don’t rate the bloke at all, the way I see it, he directed the two worst films out of the series (five and six) and has continued in a similar fashion in Part 1 & 2. But I don’t think he’s the main problem as to why this film wasn’t as good as it should’ve been (oh yeah he’s a reason but not the biggest), no the biggest reason is quite simply because they split the film into two parts. I really hope this doesn’t become a trend for films to start doing this because if Harry Potter can’t pull it off, not many will be able to. You see, splitting a film into two parts makes the film lose its flow which I’ll talk about later on. So, yeah, sorry David Yates, you don’t have a thing on Alfonso Cuarón or Mike Newell. The former being the director of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and the latter being the director of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. These two are my personal favourites purely because they feel the most magical (‘cause you know it’s a film about wizards and magic and stuff) and yet Yates has somehow managed to suck the magic out of it and to try and rectify that in this final one, he just puts in a load of cheesy lines and references from the old, ‘good’ films, which is rather annoying.

    And now for a section of the review where I will criticise J.K. Rowling heavily, so if you’re a fan boy and have a massive crush on Rowling and debase yourself in gratitude for her on a daily basis then I suggest you skip this paragraph. Right, you’re probably wondering where this irrational hatred of J.K. Rowling came from? Well, many reasons, firstly I think she’s a terrible author who couldn’t have a worse sense of pacing if she had Alzheimer’s disease (seriously, each book gets longer and longer in the amount of pages), she’s become massively rich all because of one series of average books which have been excelled in success purely because of the film industry and nothing to do with her writing. All her ‘creativity’ that is so highly appreciated is all ripped off from Roman & Greek mythology (Severus, Minerva & Luna are all just a few examples) therefore she is not a terrific storyteller as someone who writes stories should be ‘creative’ rather than ‘knowledgeable’ I’m afraid. Also, anyone who makes one of their most loveable characters gay (that’s right she overtly stated that Dumbledore is gay on national television) is someone who is so unbelievably desperate for popularity she tries to make her own fictional characters ‘modern’ and ‘current’. It sickens me. I could go on a whole long tangent of reasons why I don’t like her but the fact of the matter is: she’s a billionaire, and I’m nothing but a mere speck on her radar so it begs the question: who’s winning? Well her obviously, but that doesn't necessarily mean I'm wrong.

    Rant over, you can read on now without resenting me (yes I’m aware I’m going to get a lot of stick for that last paragraph but I couldn’t care less), anyway the positives and negatives of this film. Positives: Neville Longbottom finally comes out of his shell which is nothing short of awesome. Ralph Fiennes & Alan Rickman couldn’t act better in it as mentioned earlier. Maggie Smith is quite brilliant as Professor McGonnagall (apart from one stupidly cheesy line which I’m sure to those who have seen the film shouldn’t be too hard to figure what I’m on about.)  It also has some beautifully crafted scenes about Snape’s past which I saw coming but enjoyed nonetheless and it rounds the story off pleasantly.

    Okay, positives over, now for the negatives: the epilogue is a huge, monumental failure on every conceivable level which only puts the thought of ‘oh God I hope they don’t do a spin-off series’ into your head so that’s embarrassing to watch and makes you think ‘when will it all end? Harry Potter and Ron’s mid-life crisis? Harry Potter and his new wand? Harry Potter and Hermione’s struggle to accept her sexuality?’ A lot of the scenes also feel very rushed as a result of them splitting the film into two parts and in some scenes the speed is extremely slow and packed with dialogue, now I’m sorry, I love dialogue (The Social Network is a brilliant film and that was nothing but dialogue) however, with a seven film build-up all of this fetch quest crap should not be the main focus, the main focus should be the ‘battle of Hogwarts’! But no, instead the ‘Battle of Hogwarts’ is going on in the background and we have to sit through the three bloody musketeers trundling along to find the remaining horcruxes. Boring! I thought we were done with this crap! We want to see spells being casted and sad emotional scenes where loveable characters die valiantly.

    Unfortunately, my wish was not granted, no instead the loveable characters’ deaths were all just one second shots so no emotional value can be taken in and you can’t help but despise the film for it. Also, what’s happened to the score?! It’s non-existent; it’s just eerie, depressing scratches from the violin. That’s another big mistake by the film, why did they keep changing composers for each film? That way every composer’s just been ripping off other’s scores in a desperate bid to try and outdo each other.  Still, if you want to know the best score, it’s easily Nicholas Hooper’s from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix; listen to that it’s brilliant and is that film’s only redeeming quality.

    There are even more negatives to this film which I shall not divulge into further because I now have to finally raise the ultimate question: should you go see it? Of course you should go see it! Why the hell not? It’s the last Harry Potter, an end of era and all that. No it’s not a masterpiece and yes it is very disappointing as you expect a film with seven predecessors to be better, but it’s rounded off the story quite pleasantly so just go watch it to see how it ends. In summary, if you like the Harry Potters you’ll most likely be disappointed by this last one, however, if you love the Harry Potters you’ll probably really enjoy this one because congratulations; you’re a fan boy and wouldn’t be disappointed if it was J.K. Rowling onscreen for two and a half hours bathing in her billions which she’s earned purely because of idiots like me going to watch this. Hey leave me alone, these films are my 'childhood', right?

The Fighter Review: Rating - 9.2/10 [13th July 2011]

I did mention in my X-Men review that The Fighter was a close contender for the best film of 2011. And now after having watched it for the second time I can safely conclude that halfway through the year, it’s already there. Not only is the best film of the year so far, this may even be one of the best boxing films ever made. A grand statement? Yes, maybe so but go watch the film and you’ll understand. Okay, it might not be as good as my personal favourite boxing film (Raging Bull) but it comes damn close and is fairly reminiscent of it as well.

    The story follows the true lives of boxers Dicky Eklund & Micky Ward. Dicky being the older, faded boxer who turned to crack addiction and has been training his younger brother Micky ever since he was young whilst Micky is the quiet, patronised brother who has a lot of pressure on him to restore their town’s reputation. The narrative reflects the brothers’ relationship with one another by following two separate plots which occasionally collide with each other and in the end come together. One side of the story follows Micky’s struggle to win a fight which is not due to his boxing skill so much as his awful management led by his mother Alice and his brother Dicky. However, when he meets a barmaid called Charlene and falls in love, things start to go his way. The other side of the story shows us what a disappointment Dicky’s become; after knocking down the great Sugar Ray Leonard, he (for unexplained reasons) suddenly turned to drugs (probably due to complacency and arrogance) and so never got a title fight and was wasted talent because of that. So, not much to say on the plot, except it plays out like any other great boxing film and it is ultimately about whether Micky should pay for his brother's behaviour.

    Mark Wahlberg has the lead as Micky, whilst Christian Bale plays the crack-addicted Dicky and my God do they do a good job. This is easily Wahlberg’s best performance ever after a car-crash of mediocre films like The Italian Job & Planet of the Apes; he has finally risen to the occasion and done a brilliant job. His character starts off as the quiet one of the family but as the film progresses he starts to realise that he’s the one boxing and so starts to speak up above his dysfunctional, bat-shit crazy family, something that you can tell he’s never done before. This act of ‘coming out of the shell’ is executed perfectly and makes for some very interesting scenes especially when emotions are running high. Bale is of course superb. How an earth he can go from a 200 pound Batman to a 135 pound crack-addict is phenomenal. He is an absolute joy to watch on-screen and you have to see him to believe how good he is.

    Melissa Leo plays the mother Alice who is a very hateable character, but even though you have a lot of resentment for her there are still scenes in which you feel a lot of sympathy. Subsequently, any actress that can pull off a character with hateable and likeable features while still keeping up with the story is definitely an actress worthy of an Oscar. Amy Adams was also impressive as Micky’s girlfriend Charlene, but although she did a great job she was up against Natalie Portman for Black Swan so... yeah...

    When a film is this good, finding criticism can be extremely difficult, however, the one thing I will say is that if you don’t have any interest in boxing you may find it difficult to love this film, however, that doesn’t mean you can’t appreciate the extremely good acting, perfect atmosphere, and great soundtrack. The best part about The Fighter though isn’t even boxing related. Above all, the best thing it does is make a stereotypical inspiring, ‘feel good’ boxing film like Rocky and yet manages to do so without being unbelievably cheesy which I think is brilliant as Rocky, whilst very inspiring, felt a bit too artificial whereas The Fighter feels real and involving and nothing short of excellent.

    Well, that’s all about I can say on that guys, go see it and like it if you enjoy a good film or go and see it and love it if you enjoy boxing films. Also, by now I’m sure you’ve all been really clever and noticed that I’ve been avoiding bad films like the plague, but that is mainly because I don’t get paid for doing this, I am entirely independent and I know, as a reviewer I should be reviewing all ‘types’ of film, good or bad, but at the moment I don’t fancy watching a film that I know will be bad because that just makes for a bad time at the cinema and renders you friendless. In order to rectify that here is a list of all the films that came out this year which you should definitely avoid: The Tourist, Season of the Witch, The chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, The Hangover Part II, Gulliver’s Travels, Battle: Los Angeles, Transformers: Dark of the Moon (or any Transformers movie for that matter) and Arthur. Sorry to cut the review short but as I said there isn’t much to say on The Fighter other than that I highly recommend it and besides I have a busy week ahead of me and so need to sleep. Have a good week and I shall see you next wednesday.

Black Swan Review: Rating - 8.0/10 [6th July 2011]

Black Swan, it may leave you dazzled, scared and even a little confused, but one thing it most certainly will not leave you as is happy. Nope I’m afraid to say this is not a happy film people. Whatever positive ideas and thoughts you have about the beautiful art of ballet have been discarded for a much more erotically charged, dark, psychological horror flick which depicts the extreme turmoil that these dancers have to endure, instead of focusing on the extremely good choreography and brilliant dances that they perform. So, if you haven’t seen this film yet, and only heard about it, certain questions will be coursing through your mind I’m sure, which I’m more than happy to answer.

    Yes, the story’s exaggerated (stuff like this doesn't happen to most ballerinas.) Yes, it lives up to all its hype. Yes, it’s Natalie Portman’s best performance yet. Yes, she couldn’t look better in it. No, it’s not a brilliant film. Well, it may be, for the right person. Someone who loves ballet can handle extremely sexual scenes and isn’t freaked out by self-mutilation in a film about ballet; then yeah definitely this is the film for you. However, for me personally it all comes down to taste; I’m not a huge fan of ballet, I respect it and all the hard work that is put into it but I don’t enjoy it as such, which is why I didn’t like this film as much as I could have done.

    The story is about (as I’m sure you know) Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake. For those unfamiliar with this, Swan Lake was crafted from old Russian folk tales and tells the story of Odette, a princess who gets turned into a swan by an evil sorcerer and needs love to break the spell. The prince who was supposed to save her falls for the wrong swan (the seductive black swan Odile) and so Odette kills herself and in death finds happiness. Now Black Swan follows the story of Nina, a terrific ballet dancer who can dance the White Swan perfectly but can’t grasp the seductive, sexy Black Swan counterpart.

    Raised by a domineering, borderline psychotic mother, Nina has always been pushing and pushing herself to please both her mother and her artistic director, Thomas. Especially because her theatre group is doing a new production of Swan Lake and so Thomas is looking for a new dancer to play the star role and under unusual circumstances Nina gets picked to play the Swan Queen which leads to a break in her mental fragility mainly due to an intense rivalry with co-dancer Lily. And that’s all I’m going to say on that as to not give anything away because there are a few twists and turns in the story which I don’t think many will see coming.

    As for the acting, this is Natalie Portman’s best film yet. She plays Nina’s naivety with utter grace and absolutely perfects the metamorphosis of the character in both mind and body. Barbara Hershey plays an excellent controlling mother who we start to empathise with in some ways as she gave up her entire life to have Nina, whilst Vincent Cassel’s character Thomas is just a sexual deviant, nothing else, (he plays it well though nonetheless). Mila Kunis playing Lily, while extremely attractive I don’t think is cut out for massive feature films like Black Swan, she should stick to voice acting instead. (Yes she’s the voice of Meg from Family Guy). However, all you really need to know acting wise is 1. Natalie Portman & Mila Kunis make out in one scene and 2. The majority of the film is centred around Natalie Portman’s character and seeing as she does a brilliant job (truly worthy of that Oscar) none of the other actors matter too much.

    Darren Aronofsky (Requiem for a Dream & The Wrestler) directs this work of art, who burst onto the scene in 1998 with Pi, that being reasonably successful he created Requiem for a Dream in the year 2000 which was even more successful and established him as a top director and it looks like he has no intention of slowing down as this film shows. Every scene feels dark and mysterious even when they’re just practicing their dance moves the atmosphere is still edgy and intriguing which makes for an excellent basis for the story to evolve as it becomes progressively twisted and warped. However, this atmosphere wouldn’t be so profound if it wasn’t for the inclusion of Clint Mansell, an extremely talented composer who has composed music for Aronofsky in the past but here really steps it up a notch in adding to the compelling atmosphere by adapting Tchaikovsky’s original music into a more deranged sound which gives the film its edge.

    To be honest I can’t think of many negatives to this film, apart from the fact that you may not enjoy it so much if you don’t like ballet. However, you don’t need to know anything about ballet to enjoy it, which is refreshing; usually films like this tend to require an audience with a reasonable amount of knowledge on the topic but not this film. But, any criticism I can muster is instantly dissolved in my mind when I remember that Natalie Portman & Mila Kunis make out and no I’m not being ‘sexist’ or ‘misogynistic’; it’s a very important scene but to elaborate on that might give something away so I’m keeping my mouth shut. In all honesty though there are loads of reasons to go see this film, the incredibly talented acting, to see Natalie Portman in her prime (and make out with Mila Kunis), the great score, to figure out what’s happening with all this creepy, self-mutilation stuff and and although you may not enjoy it as much as ballet fanatics, I promise you will still enjoy it. Well worth a watch.

 X-Men: First Class Review: Rating - 9.0/10 [29th June 2011]

Okay. Let me make this absolutely clear. X-Men: First Class is one of the best films of 2011. Its only close contenders are The Fighter and Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows which is set to be released in December. Seriously, massive X-Men fan or not (I am the latter), this is a film to see. You don’t need to know anything about the previous films to grasp the concept at all; they’re starting completely from scratch. Which this film proves, is only a good thing.

    So why is this new reboot of the ‘X-Men’ franchise so good? Well, good acting, solid direction and a great score, that’s why. (Oh and because Brett Ratner’s not directing as well.) Honestly, this film is a breath of fresh air in the murky, 3D infested environment we’re calling the ‘film industry’ these days. It’s so refreshing to see an action movie that doesn’t feel the need to wave the camera around needlessly every five seconds just to show another explosion in order to stall the gaping masses from drooling into their popcorn for too long, (Also known as ‘Michael Bay syndrome'.)

    No. Instead First Class balances action and dialogue superbly; giving a set of terrific action scenes on the one hand, whilst also showing real character depth of the mutants and a steady narrative which doesn’t rely on its effects, so much as the brilliant acting. Remember, how Nolan showed us the psychological impact of Batman and the effects it had on Bruce Wayne’s body and social life in The Dark Knight? Well, First Class goes down a similar path, showing how mutants with a strong physical appearance (like ‘Beast’ or ‘Mystique’) would have felt extremely isolated and alienated from ‘normal’ society and a lot of the plot becomes their struggle to accept that. (However, this caused a small problem for me which I shall talk about later.)

    The acting? Sublime. The people who helped cast the actors for this film have done an excellent job. James McAvoy has already proved himself as a great young actor in films such as Atonement, but this is his best by far. He plays the young professor Xavier who seems to have had it easy, what with him being very rich and clever, it appears he has just glided through life without suffering any hardship, (especially as he has the power of telepathy) but this contrasts sharply with Michael Fassbender’s character Erik Lehnsherr who would later go onto become the all-powerful Magneto. (Michael Fassbender being the best actor in the film is a force to be reckoned with and I would keep an eye on him if I were you because rumour has it that he’s set to be the next James Bond when Daniel Craig’s had enough, which is the best film news I’ve heard in months.)

    So the juxtaposition between these two characters makes for an excellent story arc when they do finally meet each other through a CIA programme, as Erik has had to witness the murder of his mother and survive through the holocaust where he was tested on by the Nazis (and one in particular) to try and enhance his power somewhat, (the power of magnetism.) Whereas Xavier has had a laid back ‘easy’ life thus far. Their contrasting backgrounds also helps reflect their contrasting theories about Mutants: Xavier believes in a Utopian world where mutants and humans can live in harmony which comes off as a bit naive, whereas Lehnsherr has the idea that humans will turn on the mutants and so need to be wiped out, and as I’m sure you know (or have guessed) this leads to their inevitable doomed friendship. Also, said particular Nazi is Sebastian Shaw played by Kevin Bacon who seems to be having a lot of fun with this character and adds a great wealth of experience to the acting side of the film.

   Other notable performances are the young Nicholas Hoult who makes an excellent Beast and is still a talent in the making (you may remember him from his performance as Marcus in About a Boy), and Jennifer Lawrence who plays a very self-conscience Mystique. There is also a familiar cameo in the film which made me cry with laughter, but that’s all I’m going to say for that, hopefully it hasn’t been spoiled for you by friends because it is one of the scenes which makes the whole film enjoyable. I would definitely recommend seeing this film based solely on the acting but First Class doesn't stop there.

    Matthew Vaughn (director of the extremely politically incorrect but otherwise brilliant Kickass) and Brian Singer (director of the first two X-Men films) team up for this prequel; Vaughn directing and Singer producing, making a brilliant foundation for the franchise to be revitalised after the series was thrown to the ground unexpectedly in the form of the awful X-Men: The Last Stand and then pummelled repeatedly in the face in the form of the abysmal X-Men Origins: Wolverine. The former attack being led by the aforementioned Brett Ratner and the latter attack led by Gavin Hood which drove the franchise into the ground (and you get the picture, beaten to death et cetera.)  However, thankfully Vaughn and Singer have attempted the impossible and brought the X-Men series back from the brink to create this awesome piece of work.

    Two more final good points about this film that I’ll mention are the score, (composed by Henry Jackman who worked with Vaughn to make the Kickass score), who hits the spot in making it really sound like an X-Men film, and the costume designers; finally an X-Men film that actually looks like an X-Men film. The black and yellow costumes that they wear in the film are the actual costumes that the original X-Men wore in the comics which the previous X-Men films seemed to turn a blind eye to. And the dreary grey colour scheme used in the first two films is tossed aside for a more vibrant, aesthetically pleasing environment for the characters to show off their powers in.

    While I do pretty much love this film, there was one constant undercurrent that really bugged me. This whole theme of ‘mutant and proud' develops throughout the film and while yes, it would be very horrible to be out casted for the way you look and so on, I’m just not feeling it as it repeats itself over and over, although it is a very good sociological idea to focus on for character depth the repetition used for emphasis just comes off as cheesy but hey maybe that’s just me. Another ‘negative’ to the film is that it made a few mistakes in continuity and historical accuracy but if you’re really that bothered by movie mistakes then you can’t like many films because most movies make at least one mistake. So personally I don’t believe they had any impact on the overall quality of the film especially because I didn’t even notice them whilst watching the film.

    Summing up, don’t let that last part put you off, this is an extremely good film and the really great thing that you notice is, in the grand scheme of the things, the series is now back in the hands of people who can control massive action scenes and serious intelligence in dialogue that the franchise demands. So, if you like super hero films or even just action films in general, go watch this film! Even if you know very little about the near fifty year history of the X-Men it honestly doesn’t matter. I would recommend at least trying to catch this at the cinema but if you don’t it doesn’t matter too much, just wait for it to come out on DVD and I’m sure it’ll be just as good. 

    Neil Burger (The Illusionist) directs and while I wouldn’t say he’s done a ‘bad’ job I would say someone could’ve done it better, (some of his camera angles made my eyes hurt). For me I think that person is Guy Ritchie, a man with a great eye for a certain composition that this film deserves. I think of Ritchie because there are several scenes in Limitless where Eddie shows off his new found powers of deduction and while Cooper pulls off the dialogue superbly, the camera angles used make the scenes lose their spark, whereas if you’ve seen the new re-boot of Sherlock Holmes not only does Downey Jr. pull off the dialogue, Ritchie sets the scene up perfectly. (It’s hard to explain but go watch both films and you’ll see the differences). However, where the direction lacks, the screenplay more than makes up for; written and adapted for the screen by Leslie Dixon it is one of the film’s high points.